


Summer's Lease

by Tousled_Sky



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe, Thor (Movies)
Genre: Adoption, Aging, Death, Family, Gen, Grief/Mourning, Magic, Sibling Bonding
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-06-30
Updated: 2019-06-30
Packaged: 2020-05-31 12:16:59
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,073
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19425814
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Tousled_Sky/pseuds/Tousled_Sky
Summary: “Am I cursed?” he asks, voice haunted.“No,” Odin tells him, though he wishes, desperately, that the answer were different. A curse could be lifted, but this?This cannot be changed.An AU where Jotun's lifespans are closer to the length of humans than Asgardians.





	Summer's Lease

**Author's Note:**

> Me: It's strange that despite being from a different species, hell, from an entirely different realm, that Loki has the same lifespan as Asgardians. I wonder what it would be like if he had a lifespan more like humans?  
> My Shit Brain: >:)
> 
> Title comes from Sonnet 18 by William Shakespeare; specifically the verse "And summer’s lease hath all too short a date".

When Odin finds the baby, his cries pitifully echoing through the ruined temple, skin crisscrossed with the same heritage marks that had marred Laufey’s skin, he suspects the babe won’t live through the night.

Such a shame; Jotun’s lives were short, certainly, but not that short. Their lifespans were very much similar to those of Midgardians; 80 years average, 100 at the very longest. However, this baby was no typical frost giant; he was far too small, and it was likely his mutation was indicative of some sickness or deformation that would lead to an early death.

So Odin didn’t take him for some grand purpose; he didn’t mean to use the child to one day unite the realms, or anything as equally ridiculous. Nor did he take him to adopt him as a Prince of Asgard, to provide a younger brother for Thor.

He simply took him to warm the shivering, pitiful baby, and afford him some comfort in his last few hours.

\---

To everyone’s surprise, Loki is still alive when they reached Asgard. Not only that, but he has grown stronger; strong enough to glamour himself as an Asgardian, mimicking Odin and the few trusted Valkyries to whom he has shown the baby.

From the moment Frigga first holds the baby, Odin knows the child isn’t going anywhere. Loki, as he comes to be named, is a son to her, just as much as Thor is. “I didn’t carry him in my body, but it feels like I’ve been carrying him in my heart my whole life,” she sighs happily to Odin, looking down at the infant sleeping in her arms. “It feels like I’ve known him forever, and he’s just now come home.”

Thor, too, is stricken with love the first time he sees Loki. He’s only one hundred, maybe two hundred years old, little more than a baby himself, but he takes to the role of big brother like a fish to water. From the moment he sees the infant, all he talks about is baby, as he calls Loki. He wants to hold baby, feed baby, cuddle baby constantly.

Odin lets him, though Thor is so determined he doesn’t suppose it would matter if he had said no. In the end, he’s glad he hadn’t tried to discourage Thor from holding Loki; after all, Loki is very soon too big for Thor to hold anymore.

Far too soon.

The years go by like seasons, and Loki grows rapidly. In no time at all, Loki is the same size as Thor, talking at the same level as him; it makes Odin’s head spin, how Loki has taken only three years to grow to what Thor had grown to in over a century. Before long, Loki is big enough that his milk teeth fell out, and he proudly shows off the holes in his smile to a fascinated Thor.

By the time all his adult teeth have come in, Loki is big enough to lift Thor up, much to the little boy’s delight. The first prince adores Loki, and loves being carried around on piggyback by the boy who is so much younger, but so much bigger, than him.

At Thor’s age, he doesn’t question such things; baby used to be little enough to hold, but now he’s big enough to scoop Thor up and toss him in the air. That doesn’t register as strange to a child Thor’s age.

But it certainly does with Loki.

Loki is only 15 years old (at such an age, most Asgardian children were still at their mother’s breast, not even talking or walking yet) when he comes before Odin to ask him.

“Am I cursed?” he asks, voice haunted.

“No,” Odin tells him, though he wishes, desperately, that the answer were different. A curse could be lifted, but this? This cannot be changed.

“What am I?” Loki’s voice is quiet, resigned; like he already knows the answer.

“You’re my son,” Odin answers truthfully. He knows it’s not the answer Loki’s looking for, but suspects it’s the one that he needs to hear.

Loki huffs a humorless laugh down to the ground. When he looks up, there are tears in his eyes.

“What more than that?”

Odin tells him the whole story. That Loki was born of Jotunheim, that Odin had brought him to Asgard, and how they had come to love him.

“No matter where you were born, Loki,” he tells the boy before him, “you are of Asgard now. You are my son, and I love you. Your whole family loves you. Do you understand?”

Tears drip down Loki’s face as he shakes his head. “No,” he whispers. “I don’t.”

\---

In the following few days, Odin does everything he can to try to help Loki with the transition, the new knowledge of his heritage. He takes him to the vault and has Loki lay his hand on the Casket, placing his hand over his son’s as it turns blue (it doesn’t burn him, that’s a skill Jotuns have to practice, not a natural reaction). He shows Loki the blanket he was swaddled in when he brought him home. He even promises to take Loki to the temple where he found him.

But Loki is confused, angry. He doesn’t understand why this was kept from him; he can’t accept that Odin never told him he was different because he didn’t want him to feel alienated. He’s trying to come to terms with his lifespan being so short, come to terms with the new knowledge of his heritage. He’s overwhelmed and upset.

When he leaves to stay with Frigga’s sister, Fulla, Odin tries to reason him out of leaving, but doesn’t forbid it. He understands Loki needs space to process this.

After Loki leaves for Fulla’s, Thor asks after him frequently. “When will Thor come back from Aunt Fulla’s?” is one of his most common questions.

Frigga just sighs and hugs him. “He’ll come home when he’s ready. I don’t know how long that’ll take. I can only hope that it’s soon.”

“Me too,” Thor sighs, and though it wouldn’t be fitting for the King to voice it, Odin hopes the same.

\---

Five years go by without Loki, and they pass so much slower than the first five years with Loki. Those seemed to go so fast as Loki played with Thor in the courtyard, overtaking him rapidly in size.

During these five years, Odin makes a semi-public address concerning Loki. Loki isn’t the only one who’s noticed his rapidly growth, and some of the other nobles have become curious as to the situation. Odin knows that announcing his true heritage wouldn’t go over terribly well, so the official story is that Loki is adopted from Midgard. It satisfies the masses, and Odin isn’t worried about the truth escaping; Loki doesn’t seem too keen on sharing his heritage publically, and the few Valkyries that know are loyal and sworn to secrecy.

Five years after Loki walked out, sending letters but never visiting, he returns. He’s no longer a boy, and he’s no longer angry. Instead, he’s sure of himself and seemingly at peace with what he’s learned.

“Five years ago, I was angry and upset. I was confused,” Loki says, sitting with Frigga and Odin. “But now, I’m not any of those things. I’ve come to terms with the fact that my years will be short. And I may have been confused back then, not knowing what I wanted, but that’s changed. I know how I want to spend my years now, few though they might be.” His voice cracks, and tears build up in his eyes.

“I want to spend them here, with you. If you can forgive me for being so foolish five years ago.”

“Oh, my love,” Frigga hugs him, kissing him on the top of the head, “there’s nothing to be forgiven for.”

Odin smiles, putting a hand on his shoulder. “Welcome home, my son.”

\---

The years are too few and they pass by too fast.

Loki ages with every year, growing from a young man to a man very quickly. He never marries, though he courts a few noble ladies, as well as a few of the gentlemen. When Frigga suggests marriage, however, Loki explains he doesn’t want to marry, that he doesn’t want to widow a spouse.

His marital status doesn’t cause him distress; it’s no tragedy to him that he never marries. Loki finds satisfaction in other things in his life; friends and novels are two things he loves spending time with. Mainly, however, he fills his day with his family; discussing the climate of Asgard’s politics with Odin, walking through the gardens chatting with Frigga, or playing in the courtyard with Thor.

Thor might still be just a boy, and a young boy at that, but Loki still plays with him; not like a sibling might play with their brother, but how a father might play with their son. He play-wrestles with him, swings him around by his arms, or hefts him up on his shoulders and lets Thor wrap his arms around his head and shrieks delightedly as Loki leans and plays as if he might drop Thor into the courtyards’ pond. Thor adores Loki and tails after him often, pleading “cawwy, cawwy!” with his arms extended, begging to be picked up.

It's strange, to see Loki carrying Thor when not too long ago, Thor was the one carrying Loki. But Loki is grown now, while Thor is much the same age he was when Odin first brought Loki home.

Thor remains at that same age even as Loki ages from a man to an old man, and there comes a day where he can no longer pick Thor up off the ground. The first time it happens, Odin sees him sitting on a bench in the gardens with Frigga, his mother embracing him as he cries.

Loki still talks with his father about Asgard, but scarcely a decade after he can no longer lift Thor, he starts having trouble with the discussions; forgetting things that have happened, losing thread of the conversation, and sometimes their talks have Odin struggling to keep his composure. He still goes into the gardens with Frigga, but he finds it too difficult to walk very far most days, so instead, he and Frigga sit together as they chat. She has a bench put out on his favorite hill, one he used to love to play on as a child. There’s a weeping willow there that he used to climb in for hours on end, and the bench sits right below its draping branches. Loki loves it, and now instead of spending hours climbing the tree, he spends hours sitting beneath it with his mother.

He spends time with Thor too; he’s not able to roughhouse with him anymore, so he opts instead to read him stories. Thor loves picture books, but Loki can do better than even the most gorgeous illustrations by using his Seidr to bring the stories to life. He casts illusions of heroes and villains, of princesses and dragons as Thor watches, wide-eyed and delighted.

There are a few happy years where Thor will clamor on Loki’s lap, sitting with him in the chair he can’t rise from without a cane, and listen to the stories. Though Thor holds the picture books open and turns the pages, Loki tells the stories from memory; he has to, he can’t see the print on the pages anymore. His fingers still know how to cast the shape of the dragons and the heroes, but month after month, the color dulls as his Seidr grows weaker, little by little.

Eventually Loki can no longer rise from the chair, not even with the cane.

Not long after, there comes a day where Loki can no longer rise from bed.

\---

It’s not easy to explain to Thor that Loki is dying. He’s still too young to really understand what it means, and has many questions; questions ranging from when Loki will die to what will happen to him after he dies. He asks the same many of the same questions over and over, but the most frequent one he asks is _why._ Why Loki has to die; why he can’t stay there with his family instead.

Neither Frigga nor Odin are entirely sure of the answer to that themselves.

\---

It’s a warm summer afternoon when an anxious servant girl interrupts the council meeting, her curtsy clumsy and words stuttered as she asks to speak to Odin privately.

Even as he stands to go speak with her, he already knows what she’s going to say.

Thor won’t be coming; though Odin hates to exclude him from something so important, they decided against allowing Thor to be present when Loki passes. Raising Loki has changed Odin’s opinion of the Jotun people, and though he no longer calls them monsters, the kingdom is still prejudiced against them; something Thor has very much picked up on. All Asgardian children are fearful of Jotun, and Thor is no exception. When Loki passes, so too will his glamour, and they don’t want Thor to see that; they don’t want his final memory of Loki to be one of fear.

Frigga’s sitting at Loki’s bedside when Odin arrives, both hands clasped around one of Loki’s own; her hands still youthful and slender while Loki’s are gnarled with age. There are tears running down her face, but she doesn’t wipe them away; just lets them fall as she grips her son’s hand. She holds onto him like maybe, if she holds tight enough, he won’t slip away.

Loki’s breathing is short and shallow, and his eyes are closed, but they open when Odin puts his hand upon Loki’s forehead, brushing back hair that is no longer black, but instead whiter than his own. He can feel the slight raise of the skin from the heritage lines, see the slight blue tint to Loki’s skin. His true form is showing, now, as the Seidr he’s had control over from the first few hours of his life slips away from him.

Long ago, Odin would have looked up such a face and seen an enemy. Now, he sees only his son.

“Hello, father,” Loki rasps, smiling up at Odin. “Valhalla calls me.”

Tears run down Odin’s face, and he lets them, proper behavior be damned. He kneels to hug Loki, taking care not to jostle or hurt him in his fragile state. “Go be with them, son. We’ll join you there someday.”

Loki reaches out with his free hand, the movement taking noticeable effort, and takes Odin’s hand in his own. He may be dying, but when he squeezes, Odin can feel it still.

“I’ll be waiting.”

Frigga leans in to kiss him on the forehead, tears dripping into his hair. “I love you, my son,” She whispers.

“I love you too, Mother,” Loki answers, his old eyes crinkled with a smile as he looks to her, then turns to Odin. “Just as I love you, Father.”

“I love you too, Loki,” Odin replies, squeezing his son’s hand. Loki draws breath, the sound ragged and labored, and speaks again.

“Thank you for taking me all those years ago,” he says, his eyes slowly shifting from green to red. “I wouldn’t have changed a thing. I’m glad,” he coughs, the motion shaking his whole frame, “I’m glad to be your son.”

His eyes drift close as the last of his skin becomes pale blue.

Both Odin and Frigga sit by his bed and hold his hands until the shallow breathes finally cease.

\---

They bury him beneath the willow on the hill.

His funeral isn’t a large affair. They have Loki’s face powdered so that the blue skin and heritage lines aren’t visible, but still keep it small. There weren’t a lot of people who really knew Loki; those who did are the ones that attend.

Despite not being there when Loki passed, Thor is at the burial, and every Saturday, his parents take him to visit Loki’s grave. After the first visit, where he sees the bouquet of roses laid on the grave, he gathers a fistful of dandelions from the courtyard and lays it next to the headstone when they visit the grave beneath the willow.

\---

Odin doesn’t attend council meetings, having an advisor go in his place instead. He spends his days with his closest confidants, the nearest thing a king might have to friends. The Valkyries who were there the day he brought Loki back come to visit, to bring their condolences. Nearly a century later, they still remember, and he’s unspeakably grateful to them.

Frigga sits on the bench under the willow from the time the sun rises to the time it sets. Her handmaids bring her lunch, but she has trouble eating. Much of the time, she feeds the bread they bring her to the little sparrows that Loki used to love so much, taking care to make sure the bread crumbs she tosses never land on the grave.

Thor spends his days with his friends, but is far more subdued in his play for a long time, and cries often at night. Even as time passes, he’ll never play with his friends in the same part of the courtyards where he and Loki used to play. If any of his nannies try to read him one of the same books Loki used to read he’ll become angry, he’ll hit and scream. His hands are stained yellow every Saturday, and the courtyard slowly becomes devoid of dandelions.

\---

Time heals, and as the years pass, the pain slowly fades away.

But the memories of Loki never fade; they stay clear and strong.

\---

“She is mortal, Thor. You and she were meant to live separate lives. Let her go.”

“I can’t, father, you know I can’t.” Thor grinds out, pacing the throne room before his father. “She may be mortal, but I love her!”

“You may, but your fates are not meant to intertwine. Remember her fondly, but say goodbye,” Odin advises his son.

“Not this day,” Thor protests, thunder rolling in the distance.

“This day, the next, a hundred years, it’s nothing. It’s a heartbeat,” Odin says, thinking back to a pair of blood-red eyes looking up to him. To the grave beneath the willow.

“You’ll never be ready.”


End file.
